1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments herein generally relate to apparatuses for assisting patient movement. In particular, the present invention relates to novel apparatuses for assisting a patient to move to/from a supine position to/from a seated position.
2. Description of the Related Art
Lifts for use in lifting or transporting geriatric and other patients typically lift the patient to/from a bed to/from a chair or testing device. However, when undergoing medical imaging procedures, patients often need assistance when moving to/from a seated position on an imaging bed to/from a supine position on the imaging bed.
Various factors can contribute to the patient needing assistance. For example, patients who are heavy or overweight, weak, and/or injured may not be able to reposition themselves on the imaging bed without assistance, pain, and/or causing further injury. Often, a technologist will try to provide repositioning assistance to the patient. However, there are instances when the technologist does not have sufficient strength to assist the patient, may cause injury to the patient, and/or the patient and/or the technologist does not want to come into contact with each other.
Currently, ceiling mounted and freestanding lift systems are available on the market but often times neither are readily available, are too troublesome to bring in a room, and/or have image quality problems.
Therefore there is a need in the art for an improved patient repositioning assistance.